| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.4

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.4 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

A Nation by Design: Immigration Policy in the Fashioning of America. By Aristide R. Zolberg. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2006. x, 658 pp. $39.95, ISBN 0-674-02218-1.)
Aristide R. Zolberg put the theme of this book most succinctly: It "is concerned exclusively with American immigration policy" (p. 11). Toward that end he observes that, as immigration increased, "'regulation' evolved imperceptibly from its earlier meaning of deterring undesirables from entering . . . toward the notion of imposing limits on the overall flow, and thus turned into 'restriction'" (p. 199). The 1920s saw a reversal of American policy—"whereas hitherto entry was open unless prohibited, it was now closed unless authorized" (p. 436).	1
The introduction offers a fascinating analysis, while the first chapters provide perspectives on policies in the early period at the colonial and then state levels. Federal legislation on the slave trade in 1808, followed by the 1819 Passenger Act, were the only federal immigration laws until 1875. Then, the federalization of immigration policy proceeded. Moreover, Zolberg points out that the significance of the 1790 Naturalization Act was not its exclusion of nonwhites but its inclusion of free white Europeans "regardless of nationality, religion, language, or even gender" (p. 87).	. . .

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